Today is Sula’s first birthday.

Sula in a rucksack — Sula - Photo by Alessia Longhi

She had been in my mind for a long time. Was it a good idea to get a puppy? Was it the right time? How do you know whether you’ve made a mistake till you’ve done it?

I took the plunge.

She arrived. She was tiny, small enough to curl into my lap. The first days were frenetic: I had to separate her from the other dogs. Raffi hated the sight of her and Layla liked her a little too much. Our days became punctuated by meal times and toilet breaks. I slept with her on an airbed in the sitting room: bone-aching sleepless nights, getting up every three hours to shiver under the moon.

The memories of the first days of Sula are blurred.

I don’t think I enjoyed Raffi as a puppy. He was my first dog as an adult and I was overwhelmed, worried I wasn’t up to it. In the months, the years, leading up to the decision to have Sula I thought about that a lot: I wanted this time to be different.

I was her safe place. When she’d had her injections and could at last go out, she never strayed far from my side. I didn’t needed to teach her recall; it was natural for her to come back to me.

This time I wasn’t overwhelmed. This time it was just pleasure. Sula thought the world was a wonderful place and for the moments when I was watching her, bounding, racing, enjoying her body, it really was. She leapt everywhere like a hare, like she had springs in her feet, with exhuberance, with joy. We went walking with dogs I knew and trusted and I watched her confidence and curiosity grow as she learned to play, to go a little further from me, to explore.

And now she’s a year old. She’s been mantrailing with Mantrailing UK - Rhondda Cynon Taff; she’s been to puppy and adolescent classes with WalkWagPlay, she’s done agility training with Jessica Sansome; she faces every new challenge with eagerness and enthusiasm. She’s fun, and clever, and affectionate. She likes to curl against the crook of my knees at night. She likes to put her face against mine to be kissed. She feels like velvet.

She smells like warm sugar.

Like Warm Sugar